Remove Discountwith.me pop up Ads

Dear reader, if you are reading this then you are probably fed up with the annoyance that is Discountwith.me. It is understandable that you want to the rush to the removal guide, but bear with me. The full scope of this article is to explain how Adware like Discountwith.me operates and how to best protect against it. Devote a few minutes to reading everything in order to save a lot more in the future, because new Adware pops up every day.

Discountwith.me – a short overview

As an Adware type of virus Discountwith.me has one purpose – to spam your browsers with advertisements. These can come in many forms – from the generic “best”offer deals” to a multitude of variations including:

Offers for program downloads or updates

Error messages to get missing plug-in

Demands to install a specific video player to view something

Anti-malware scans that claim to be free

Do not fall for anything spawned by Discountwith.me. As a general rule these ads will do nothing but

Waste your time to generate views for some time

Get you to spend money for nothing

Install malware posing as free program

In fact the ads are often not even real. Discountwith.me will scan your browser, analyze the history and search data and try to generate believable ads relevant to your interests. It uses your own processor to do that so if your computer has been under performing recently its probably because Discountwith.me is leeching system resources. Even if you are curious enough to follow the links you’ll see for yourself that they are often dead ends not even related to the ads. DO NOT install ANYTHING. The chances of installing another virus are nearly 100%.

But how did Discountwith.me end in your machine

There are certain viruses that exploit program vulnerabilities and against which you have little defense. Fortunately Discountwith.me is not one of them. The most likely way it landed on your browser is because you installed it yourself. Hardly comforting, but then again you probably thought you were installing something else entirely. Developers of these nasty programs will use every trick in the book to camouflage their products. Learning the most common tricks used will go a long way towards keeping your computer Adware free in the future. Lets list a few:

Freeware can also mean Adware! Free programs on their own are not dangerous, but their installers will often come packed with several extras and these can be Adware. When installing software always go for the advanced installation – you can also block access to anything you don’t need or looks suspicious.

Download/Torrent sites. These can be dangerous, but there are fakes that are even more dangerous. They will copy your search terms and generate a file with the same name – netting 100% match and first page on Google. That file is a virus. It can be easily recognized from the file extension, which will be an .exe file. Its also possible for the .exe to hide in an archive. Pay attention and NEVER install .exe files unless they are downloaded from an official site.

How to Remove Discountwith.me

STEP 1:

Our first step here is a reboot in Windows Safe Mode. If you already know how to do it, just skip this and proceed to Step 2. If you do not know how to do it, continue reading:

For Windows 98, XP, Millenium and 7 Users:

Restart your computer. To be sure you don’t miss the window of time when you need to press it, just spamF8 as soon as the PC starts booting. In the new menu, choose Safe Mode With Networking.

Proceed to Step 2.

For Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 Users:

Press the Windows Key and R at the same time. Select the Boot tab in the new window that appears.

Then check the Safe Boot option and click OK. ClickRestart in the new pop-up.

Proceed to Step 2.

For OS X Users:

When you Mac is turned off, press the Power Button. After you hear the Startup Sound, immediately press and hold the Shift key until the Apple logo appears.

Proceed to Step 2.

STEP 2:

Discountwith.me has infected ALL of your browsers. Apply the steps separately for each one.

For Internet Explorer Users:

Open IE, then click —–> Manage Add-ons.

Find Discountwith.me . Disable it.

If your Home Page is different from the usual, click —–> Internet Options>edit the URL box with your preferred search engine, and click Apply.

Open Safari, and clickSafari —–>Preferences —–> Extensions—–>Uninstall the malware.

STEP 3:

(Works for Windows XP, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1)

Hold and R together. Write appwiz.cpl in the new field, then clickOK.

You are now in the Control Panel. Search around for Discountwith.me and anything else suspicious-looking. Uninstall it/them. Also, be extremely careful. Viruses often spend one last ditch effort to trick you into installing more of their kind. If you see a screen like this when you click Uninstall, choose NO:

STEP 4:

This is perhaps the most important and difficult step, so be extremely careful. Open the Task Managerby right clicking on the Taskbar and choosing Start Task Manager.

Once it opens, choose the Processes Tab. Look at all of the processes in front of you and try to determine which ones are a virus. Google them or ask us in the comments and we will provide the best assistance we can. If the virus returns later on after you supposedly removed it, the reason is that you missed something here.

Right click on each of the virus processes separately and select Open File Location. Also, End the process after you open the folder. Just to make sure we don’t delete any programs you mistakenly took for a virus, copy the folders somewhere, then delete the directories you were sent to.

STEP 5 – Optimization

And that’s it. Well done for removing Discountwith.me. We’ve prepared a short and sweet optimization guide, specifically designed for users who just removed a virus. It is completely free, you do not need to download anything, and it’s not very time consuming. If you are interested, you can check it out here.